Books One to Three Omnibus (Armada Wars) Read online

  “Ma’am?”

  “You heard me. Take us into the atmosphere. With any luck it will play havoc with their targeting.”

  “Understood. Preparing for low orbit, atmospheric insertion.”

  The deck plating quaked and shivered in response to the conventional engines ramping up to full power. Slowly at first, but with increasing verve, Hammer began to come about and dropped quickly towards the planet.

  The dreadnought was changing direction too, bearing down on the battleship and still launching missiles from its forward tubes. It was no longer bothering to laser the rear sensor palettes on Hammer‘s hull. The fleeing ship had stopped returning fire, and only her defensive turrets were active.

  The trembling in the deck plates became a rumbling, signalling contact between the exterior hull and the rapidly thickening atmosphere of Woe Tantalum.

  “Put us in a holding orbit, Helm,” said Santani. “Low enough that we can avoid detection, high enough to climb back out of the gravity well without giving ourselves away.”

  “Yes, Ma’am. What depth would you say is low enough?”

  Klade replied for her. “Assume they have sensors like ours, descend until we can’t detect them, then drop half as far again.”

  The holos displaying the outside atmosphere continued to darken as thick clouds wrapped around the descending ship.

  “We’re levelling off,” said Helm.

  “Steady as she goes,” Santani replied. “What’s our altitude?”

  “Based on the archive entry for this planet, about fifteen klicks.”

  “I take it there’s nothing on the surface tall enough to hit us then?”

  “There’s not much on the surface taller than fifteen metres,” Klade said. “Not any more.”

  “Good, we’ll stay hidden down here until we can assess our sensor readings of that ship. We need to come up with a way to retrieve our people and—”

  Her words were rendered inaudible by the loudest imaginable noise, a great metallic booming that seemed to fill the ship. The lights on the command deck flickered and went out, and all at once the deck lurched to starboard, the gravity plating failed, and something aft of them exploded violently. Hammer was hit, and hit hard.

  “Captain,” said Tactical, “they’ve followed us in!”

  — 19 —

  Sabotage

  Vella Laekan rubbed her tired eyes and tried once more to focus on her holos. What she was looking at was difficult enough to interpret without her body failing her. Worlds knew she needed some sleep, but this was important. It was, in fact, possibly the most important thing she had ever set eyes on.

  What she had before her was a true scientific mystery: macroscopic changes to the structure of the brain, in a living person, matching nothing she could find in the vast Imperial reference libraries. What was the cause? What — if any — was the purpose?

  She had already sent out invitations to several colleagues in more suitable medical fields, asking them to travel to the fortress and assist her. With only her word that they needed to hurry she guessed they would do anything but. Branathes had forbidden her from sending any information about the Rasa via databurst.

  ‘Rasa’. It was interesting that the Tirrano woman had chosen to refer to Amarist Naeb using that term. She was so angry, it made a kind of sense that she would feel compelled to categorise people, to pin blame to them with a word. Only in this case she had the wrong meaning of the word. Tirrano thought it only meant ‘blank’, but that was not quite accurate. In its original context, it meant something that had been cleared of content. Thousands of years ago, people had recorded their musings and calculations and reasoning on malleable wax tablets. To erase those thoughts, they warmed the wax and scraped away the indentations.

  Judging by these scans, she thought, and given the way Naeb has been acting, that appears to be a more appropriate translation. But the angry intelligence operator had still jumped on the label despite her faulty association.

  Oh, and she was so very angry. Laekan had seen her files when she came to Fort Kosling.

  Tirrano’s mother, Orshan, had been killed at Chion. Captain of the Crusader, she had held her ship in the enemy’s line of fire long enough to take out the wormhole generators on one of their capital cruisers. The Viskr fleet had been unable to jump away, which was her goal, but Crusader had stood no chance of limping back to her own lines. The reactors went up, and everyone died. Everyone.

  Laekan had heard Tirrano talking to the others, whenever they were down in medical, or in the mess hall, or even just in passing. Laekan did not need her training to see that she hated the Viskr. Hated them, with a passion the doctor found slightly unnerving. In her profession she often came across such tightly bottled emotions, but rarely did she encounter a pressure cooker like Tirrano.

  Take the Shard for example. His father died on the Curtailer, when it was ambushed at Laeara. And that ship was not even destroyed outright; Modim Caden was just one of the unfortunate ones who never made it to a rescue deck. But not once had she heard the knife-edge of anger pressing into the Shard’s words when he spoke of the Viskr. Either he had long since sorted through his issues with them, or his feelings about the old enemy were wound up so tightly that even he knew nothing of them.

  She raised her head suddenly, glanced around. She had been letting her mind wander, and a slight noise brought her back to reality. It was still fresh in memory, her ears still reporting the sensation of sound, yet she had no idea what it was she had just heard.

  “Hello?” She called out.

  Nobody answered.

  Laekan spun around in her chair and got to her feet, picking up a glass mug as she did so. As long as she was passing through the medbays, she might as well get a refill.

  Walking to the open isolation hatch, she cast her gaze around. Nothing had changed. There was the Rasa, no, there was Amarist Naeb, laying on the bed. Her chest rose and fell slowly, air passing her lips silently.

  She carried on, opening the hatch at the far end of the bay. Conscientious as ever, she closed it behind her before walking into the tiny catering compartment that served all the medbays at this end of medical.

  The green light was on, so she swilled her cup out in a stream of hot water, and flushed the cold leavings from her last cup of tea down the pedestal sink.

  She filled the cup almost to the top with boiling water, and started the walk back to her work station, thinking about which variety of leaf to have next.

  Closing the medbay hatch behind her, she walked across the centre of the compartment, heading for the next compartment and the relative comfort of her work station. She was almost through the doorway when her brain forced her to stop.

  Something is different, Vella.

  She turned around. For a split-second, she was not even aware that she was having to look over someone’s shoulder to see that the bed was empty. Her brain caught up with reality, and she brought her arm up instinctively. The cup was knocked from her hand, and tea splashed across the deck.

  Laekan looked down, and saw that Naeb’s hand was already crimson. She was not yet registering the pain, but she knew it was coming. She dared not move nor make a sound, and sucked in breath through O-shaped lips. Terrified of what might happen if she let go, she held tightly to Naeb’s wrist with both hands.

  Amarist Naeb pulled back sharply, and her slick red hand slipped out of Laekan’s grasp. A searing, tearing slash of pain stabbed up through her core when the scalpel was pulled out. Laekan gasped and staggered back a few steps, bending double to cradle the deep wound that Naeb had inflicted. She clutched both hands to her abdomen, and felt nothing but wet warmth.

  Laekan collapsed to the ground, still gasping, and looked up at Naeb. The woman was impassive, blank, and paid her no more attention. Her head turned slowly to one side, looked towards the open hatch that led to the work station. She stepped through the opening.

  Doctor Vella Laekan mustered all of her strength, and strained
to reach the comm terminal on the wall. Her body resisted, a paroxysm of pain exploding within her, and she collapsed back into a crumpled heap on the floor, moaning with the agony. Gingerly, she peeled her sodden blouse away from her skin, and lifted it. Craning her neck to look down, she saw a deep slash across her abdomen. It gaped at her, and she saw the edges tear slightly wider even as she looked. She could see right into her own body; under the skin creamy blob-like fat cells were dotted around, as if not quite sure what to do with themselves now they had been pulled into the open. Dark tissue glistened beneath them, and she thought she could see a rhythmic pulse of sinuous movement. Crimson blood pumped along the lower edges of the laceration, and ran onto her paling skin.

  Killed by a damned Rasa, she thought.

  • • •

  Brant had been poring over the battle reports and tactical assessments for hours, hoping to see some single critical flaw. He was coming to the point now where he had to admit that Betombe’s strategy was entirely sound; what was at fault was the assumption that it had been based upon, and that assumption was one Brant had had a significant role in creating.

  The Viskr were not reacting as he had expected them to, indicating that he was wrong about their intentions. He looked again at the report listing the enemy fleets that Eyes and Ears were able to count. So many. Their response to Betombe’s offensive looked almost desperate. Did they even have the warheads?

  The door chimed, and Tirrano entered before he could respond.

  “What are you doing?” She demanded. “You’re supposed to be sorting out the extraction of Doctor Bel-Ures.”

  “I got side-tracked.” He gestured at the holos. “It happens a lot.”

  “Yeah, don’t I know it?” She said pointedly. She looked down at the holos and the scattered charts. “You know this isn’t our job, right?”

  “What isn’t?”

  “All of this.” She waved her hand at everything on his desk. “Commander Operations has a whole department dedicated to campaign analysis.”

  “I know, it’s just that we’re sort of involved now.”

  “So what? Fleet Command won’t listen to a word you say, even if you think you’ve found something.”

  “You’re probably right.”

  “Of course I am. So stop wasting your time, and make the arrangements to secure Doctor Bel-Ures before someone else does.”

  “Do you really think she’s at risk?”

  “The Shard seems to think so.” The faintest trace of reluctant agreement tinged her voice. “It would make sense, if she has operational knowledge of what was going on at Gemen Station.”

  “Probably should have done this already, huh?”

  “No shit.”

  Tirrano had edged her way around the desk, until she was standing next to the seated Brant. She leaned forward, curving her body, and rested her fingertips on the desk as if to peer at a holo.

  Brant rolled his eyes while hers were elsewhere, and rose to his feet on the other side of the chair. He always felt more comfortable with at least one piece of furniture between them.

  “I’d best check with Branathes, see what resources he will allow me to tie up with this.”

  “The order came from a Shard. I’d say that’s pre-authorised. What will Gordl do? Overrule him?”

  “Good point,” he said. “I’ll just get on with it.”

  “It’s waited this long,” she said. “It can wait another five minutes.” She placed a hand on his shoulder, as if to pull him closer.

  Oh worlds, he thought. Of all the times to pick, now she’s finally going to try it on.

  He was actually relieved to hear the alarms sound.

  • • •

  Calling and celebration and fulfilment

  familiar words flowing from all sides

  gently flowing

  The body that had formerly housed the personality and will of Amarist Naeb ran swiftly and quietly through the corridors, light on its feet, a weapon held down by its hip as if it were just an afterthought.

  It had found no difficulty in destroying the work station used by Laekan, in escaping medical, in ambushing a pair of security officers and taking a side-arm.

  the song, forever the song, oh by the worlds

  by all the many worlds, the song!

  waves of faces

  white spiral waves

  I understand, I belong

  It came to a junction, edged carefully around the corner, saw no-one, and crept forwards. A sealed pressure hatch barred the way at the end of the corridor, standing obstinately and confidently between the body and its objective. It cocked its head, searching for a manual release or an access panel with simple controls.

  There was nothing on or beside the barrier, nothing that looked as though it controlled it. Any access must have been granted from the other side.

  It was turning away to find another route when the hatch opened with a sharp hiss.

  yes yes, I feel you yes

  and the song is unbroken

  forever the song

  • • •

  “What’s happening?” Brant yelled.

  “Evacuate this deck,” the security officer yelled back, turning only briefly to give her answer. She kept running.

  “There’s smoke,” Brant said worriedly. “Why is there smoke? What happened to fire suppression?”

  “Come on!” Tirrano grabbed his sleeve, and pulled him along the corridor towards a printwall that displayed environmental data and the station’s public system messages.

  “Fire hatches refusing to close throughout medical,” Brant read. “Environmental systems not responding to containment protocols.”

  “Well; that could go really wrong,” said Tirrano.

  • • •

  “You can’t be in here!”

  The security officer was answered only with a gun shot, and took the hit below the left shoulder. He collapsed backwards, writhing in pain. Blood pumped between his fingers and he screamed incoherently into his link.

  It continued on its way, oblivious to his presence now that he was no longer a threat.

  Another pressure hatch barred the passageway, and like those before it this one hissed open obligingly as the remainder of Amarist Naeb approached.

  This one opened out onto a broad platform, a huge hangar-like space with maintenance bays marked out on the deck plating. It was close now.

  Across the platform, moving swiftly over a narrow cat-walk bridge that connected to another identical platform, a chasm that dropped through six decks just beneath its feet.

  On this platform was a shuttle, left with its insides hanging out when the workers had responded to the sound of the alarms. It went around. The pressure hatches in the far bulkhead hissed open. It walked through the opening, unopposed, directly into the vast space of Dry-dock Nine.

  Before it lay the sleeping body of the ICS Hector.

  • • •

  Brant had thought it was chaotic before, with the smoke creeping down the bulkheads and the alarms whining in every passageway. When the lights started to go out, and the entire deck boomed with the repercussions of some heavy impacts elsewhere in the station, his sense of apprehension was lifted to a whole new level.

  “What the hell was that?”

  “No idea, keep moving,” said Tirrano. She steered him around a corner in the direction indicated helpfully by an emergency printwall.

  The noise was repeated, and the deck actually warped beneath their feet. Tirrano stumbled into Brant, and a man following close behind them tripped over the edge of a piece of plating that had dislodged from the deck.

  The lights went out completely, and it felt like a long few seconds before the emergency lighting faded on. Soft blue draped itself diffidently across the faces of the people who were so dependent on it.

  They started moving again, as soon as they were able to walk safely under the faint light. Another booming thud shook the deck plating, and the muffled sound of a huge explosion
rumbled up and down corridors a few decks below them. The emergency lighting faded almost to nothing, then came back up to full strength, such as it was. Brant felt the pull of the gravity plating weaken.

  They rounded the final corner, and Tirrano ushered people into the deck’s survival shelter, Brant first. Only when the last person had ducked through the circular port did she swing the heavy hatch closed behind her.

  • • •

  Dry-dock Nine was an inferno. Hector pummelled the bulkheads with bitter fury, firing her forward cannons one after another, as quickly as they could reload. Ragged holes had been chewed through to the adjacent dry-docks and repair bays, and searing jets of burning gas poured like lifeblood from severed conduits and pipelines. Nobody else would be coming to board the ship any time soon.

  Moving clumsily, the corvette rose away from the docking run, tearing clamps and supports from their housings. The lateral gauss guns spun around and fired repeatedly at the sealed hatches that barricaded the way to the docking channel.

  Air began to whistle from the dry-dock: the hatches were breached. A ship-to-ship missile finished them off.

  With all the grace expected of a damaged ship with a crew of one, Hector limped through the scorched opening and made her bid for freedom.

  — 20 —

  Light the Dark

  Throam came around slowly, his ears ringing, and at first he thought he had gone blind. Then he remembered where he was, and wriggled hard until the dry impact foam around his head and hands broke into lumps and fell away. The inside of the lander was a mess, with containers thrown out of place and a layer of hardened foam coating every surface. The dry tang of electrically burned smoke filled his nostrils.

  Groans and shouts came from every direction, the sounds of a slightly dazed and battered platoon recovering from the impact that had silenced the lander’s dying engines. Throam punched his arms free, tore away a large piece of the shell-like foam that covered his midriff, and released his safety harness.